Five Children and It (Vintage Classics: Psammead #1))

'Don't you know a sand-fairy when you see one?' I dare say you have often thought about what you would do if you were granted three wishes. The five children - Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane and their baby brother - had often talked about it but when they are faced with the grumpy sand-fairy they find it difficult to make up their minds. And that is just the beginning of their dilemmas. As they discover, there is nothing quite like a wish for getting you into terrible trouble. BACKSTORY: Learn about what it was like to be a child in 1902 and try some fun activities!

Promotion info

'I love E. Nesbit - I think she is great and I identify with the way that she writes. Her children are very real children and she was quite a groundbreaker in her day' JK Rowling

Author description

Edith Nesbit was born in 1858. Her father died when she was only three and so her family moved all over England. Poverty was something she had known first hand, both as a child and as a young married woman with small children. Like the Railway Childrens' Mother she was forced to try and sell her stories and poems to editors.Her first children's book, The Treasure Seekers, was published in 1899. She also wrote Five Children and It but her most famous story is The Railway Children which was first published in 1905 and it hasn't been out of print since. Edith Nesbit was a lady ahead of her time - she cut her hair short which was considered a very bold move in Victorian times and she was a founding member of a group that worked towards improvements in politics and society called The Fabian Society. She died in 1924.